The Confidence Game: Why We Fall for It...Every Time

While cheats and swindlers may be a dime a dozen, true conmen - the Bernie Madoffs, the Jim Bakkers, the Lance Armstrongs - are elegant, outsized personalities, artists of persuasion, and exploiters of trust. How do they do it? Why are they successful? And what keeps us falling for it over and over again? These are the questions that journalist and psychologist Maria Konnikova tackles in her mesmerizing new book.

A Guide to Deduction: The Ultimate Handbook for Any Aspiring Sherlock Holmes or Doctor Watson

A Guide to Deduction is the ultimate handbook for any aspiring Sherlock Holmes or Watson. Building on the massively successful aguidetodeduction.tumblr.com, the book includes not only advice on deducing aspects of an individual, but a wide range of skills every detective needs. Learn how to build a mind palace, interrogate, and break codes on par with the world's only consulting detective.

Find Out Anything from Anyone, Anytime: Secrets of Calculated Questioning from a Veteran Interrogator

The secret to finding out anything you want to know is amazingly simple: Ask good questions. Most people trip through life asking bad questions - of teachers, friends, coworkers, clients, prospects, experts, and suspects. Even people trained in questioning, such as journalists and lawyers, commonly ask questions that get partial or misleading answers. People in any profession will immediately benefit by developing the skill and art of good questioning.

You will learn even more advance techniques for psychological warfare, mind control, manipulation, persuasion, Dark CBT, deception, and seduction than in the first book. This audiobook will catapult you into the amazing realm of control and power over others. No one will be able to stop you now. Whether you use these dark methods for good or evil is up to you. Certainly these methods are not light and they are not jokes. You will have a lot of lethal power by the time you set this book down. So carefully consider how you want to use this power and what your motives are.

The Art of Psychological Warfare: How to Skillfully Influence People Undetected and How to Mentally Subdue Your Enemies in Stealth Mode

This book teaches you personal interaction on a psychological level. It runs from trivial tricks like getting people to like and respect you more, to tactical life skills like making a convincing argument or persuading somebody to do you a large favor. In case you're up for some heavier artillery, it also teaches you how to play manipulative tricks on people by exploiting arcane quirks in the human mind, to psychological combat maneuvers practiced by law enforcement and the military.

Dark psychology is one of the most powerful forces at work in the world today. It is used by the most powerful influencers the world has ever known. Those who are unaware of it risk having it used against them. Don't run that risk!

Reality Is Plastic: The Art of Impromptu Hypnosis

This audiobook is about hypnosis and how to use it effectively. It will teach you what hypnosis is and how to hypnotize both individuals and groups of people anytime and anywhere you choose. No prior experience of hypnosis is required to understand and apply the knowledge in this book. The techniques are deceptively simple yet incredibly powerful. They are entirely practical and have been road tested over many years, with thousands of people.

Moonwalking with Einstein

Foer's unlikely journey from chronically forgetful science journalist to U.S. Memory Champion frames a revelatory exploration of the vast, hidden impact of memory on every aspect of our lives. On average, people squander forty days annually compensating for things they've forgotten. Joshua Foer used to be one of those people. But after a year of memory training, he found himself in the finals of the U.S. Memory Championship. Even more important, Foer found a vital truth we too often forget.

A Spy's Guide to Thinking

In this 45-minute listen, a former spy introduces two simple tools for thinking. The first describes how we think. The second helps us think ahead. They are the essential tools for getting things done. The tools are applied to an incident in a subway car in Europe where a spy faces a new enemy. Then, they're reapplied to Saddam Hussein's stockpiling (or not) of weapons of mass destruction.

Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst

Why do we do the things we do? More than a decade in the making, this game-changing book is Robert Sapolsky's genre-shattering attempt to answer that question as fully as perhaps only he could, looking at it from every angle. Sapolsky's storytelling concept is delightful, but it also has a powerful intrinsic logic: He starts by looking at the factors that bear on a person's reaction in the precise moment a behavior occurs and then hops back in time from there in stages, ultimately ending up at the deep history of our species and its evolutionary legacy.

Perennial Seller: The Art of Making and Marketing Work That Lasts

How can we create and market creative works that achieve longevity? Holiday explores this mystery by drawing on his extensive experience working with businesses and creators such as Google, American Apparel, and the author John Grisham as well as his interviews with the minds behind some of the greatest perennial sellers of our time.

Spencer Perry says:"The Most Comprehensive Book on Making Things, Ever"

Captivate: The Science of Succeeding with People

Do you wish you could decode people? Do you want to know exactly what to say to your boss, your date, or your networking partner? You need to know how people work. As a human behavior investigator, Vanessa Van Edwards studies the hidden forces that drive our behavior patterns in her lab - and she's cracked the code. In Captivate she shares a wealth of valuable shortcuts, systems, and behavior hacks for taking charge of their interactions at work, at home, and in any social situation.

Mindshift reveals how we can overcome stereotypes and preconceived ideas about what is possible for us to learn and become. At a time when we are constantly being asked to retrain and reinvent ourselves to adapt to new technologies and changing industries, this book shows us how we can uncover and develop talents we didn't realize we had - no matter what our age or background.

I, Spy: How to Be Your Own Private Investigator

Have you ever wanted to be your own private eye? Have you ever wanted to track down long-lost relatives or people who've scammed you? Have you ever wanted to know if your kids really are where they say they are? Or if your significant other is cheating on you? Or how to locate assets in order to collect on a judgment? World-renowned private investigator Dan Ribacoff will show you how.

Sherlock Holmes

Ever since he made his first appearance in A Study In Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes has enthralled and delighted millions of fans throughout the world. Now Audible is proud to present Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, read by Stephen Fry. A lifelong fan of Doyle's detective fiction, Fry has narrated the definitive collection of Sherlock Holmes - four novels and four collections of short stories. And, exclusively for Audible, Stephen has written and narrated eight insightful introductions, one for each title.

The Complete Sherlock Holmes: The Heirloom Collection

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes tales are rightly ranked among the seminal works of mystery and detective fiction. Included in this collection are all four full-length Holmes novels and more than forty short masterpieces - from the inaugural adventure A Study in Scarlet to timeless favorites like “The Speckled Band” and more. At the center of each stands the iconic figure of Holmes - brilliant, eccentric, and capable of amazing feats of deductive reasoning.

Algorithms to Live By: The Computer Science of Human Decisions

All our lives are constrained by limited space and time, limits that give rise to a particular set of problems. What should we do, or leave undone, in a day or a lifetime? How much messiness should we accept? What balance of new activities and familiar favorites is the most fulfilling? These may seem like uniquely human quandaries, but they are not: computers, too, face the same constraints, so computer scientists have been grappling with their version of such problems for decades.

Develop clarity of thought. Avoid analysis paralysis. Make better decisions. Never miss a beat. Clear and effective thinking clashes with most of our instincts and habits. Think Like Einstein will shine a light onto the mistakes you've been making and show you how to defeat them once and for all.

Do you want to have more fruitful and harmonious relationships? Using this easy-to-follow book with simple ways of analyzing and categorizing personalities you can! This book is a good guide for anyone wishing to learn about human behavior in all is diverse glory.

The Scientific Sherlock Holmes: Cracking the Case with Science and Forensics

In The Scientific Sherlock Holmes, James O'Brien provides an in-depth look at Sherlock Holmes's use of science in his investigations. Indeed, one reason for Holmes's appeal is his frequent use of the scientific method and the vast scientific knowledge which he drew upon to solve mysteries. For instance, in heart of the audiobook, the author reveals that Holmes was a pioneer of forensic science, making use of fingerprinting well before Scotland Yard itself had adopted the method.

Social Engineering: The Art of Human Hacking

From elicitation, pretexting, influence and manipulation all aspects of social engineering are picked apart, discussed and explained by using real world examples, personal experience and the Science & Technology behind them to unraveled the mystery in social engineering. Kevin Mitnick - one of the most famous social engineers in the world - popularized the term social engineering. He explained that it is much easier to trick someone into revealing a password than to exert the effort of hacking.

A Burglar's Guide to the City

Encompassing nearly 2,000 years of heists and tunnel jobs, break-ins and escapes, A Burglar's Guide to the City offers an unexpected blueprint to the criminal possibilities in the world all around us. You'll never see the city the same way again.

The Good Psychopath's Guide to Success

If you are bored and unfulfilled by dry and overly worthy self-help manuals, then this is the audiobook for you! Listen to this and take a very different look at yourself! Former SAS hero Andy McNab and eminent psychologist Professor Kevin Dutton are unlikely partners. As Oxford academic and bestselling author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths, Kevin Dutton has plenty of experience of psychopaths, but he'd never met anyone quite like Andy McNab, decorated war hero and special forces warrior.

Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Enlightenment

From one of America's greatest minds, a journey through psychology, philosophy, and lots of meditation to show how Buddhism holds the key to moral clarity and enduring happiness. In Why Buddhism Is True, Wright leads listeners on a journey through psychology, philosophy, and a great many silent retreats to show how and why meditation can serve as the foundation for a spiritual life in a secular age.

Publisher's Summary

No fictional character is more renowned for his powers of thought and observation than Sherlock Holmes. But is his extraordinary intellect merely a gift of fiction, or can we learn to cultivate these abilities ourselves, to improve our lives at work and at home?

We can, says psychologist and journalist Maria Konnikova, and in Mastermind she shows us how. Beginning with the "brain attic" - Holmes's metaphor for how we store information and organize knowledge - Konnikova unpacks the mental strategies that lead to clearer thinking and deeper insights.

Drawing on 21st-century neuroscience and psychology, Mastermind explores Holmes's unique methods of ever-present mindfulness, astute observation, and logical deduction. In doing so, it shows how each of us, with some self-awareness and a little practice, can employ these same methods to sharpen our perceptions, solve difficult problems, and enhance our creative powers.

For Holmes aficionados and casual listeners alike, Konnikova reveals how the world's most keen-eyed detective can serve as an unparalleled guide to upgrading the mind.

What the Critics Say

"A delightful tour of the science of memory, creativity, and reasoning ... engaging and insightful." (Steven Pinker, Harvard College professor of Psychology, Harvard University, author of How the Mind Works and The Stuff of Thought)

What I imagined to be a book about how the greatest detective, Sherlock Holmes, solves crimes ended up being about how he thinks. Which was far more beneficial.

The book actually covers a great deal of current scientific studies in psychology and how the brain works. This shows how Sherlock was a step above the rest in his thinking and deductive reasoning.

It also shows the influences acting on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that prompted him to create a character with such, at first glance, peculiar habits that actually lead to better cognitive function ...for example, from time to time when I have been stressed or overwhelmed, I would have a strong urge to go for a walk or hike, now I know why!

There is lots of great information in this one, information that I can't get by just listening once!

Do you know what I learned in the first hour of this book while I went on my morning 5 mile run before I realized that there are no chapter markers?

Absolutely nothing. I actually groaned out loud numerous times and yelled "Come ON! Are you serious?" to the running path. The only explanation I can think of is that author must have been paid by the word, because she has reinvented the meaning of taking commonly known ideas and taken the phrase "beating a dead horse" into new heights. To take on the tone of the author, I have crafted a representative paragraph:

"Sometimes a horse is dead, yet you keep beating it (reads a paragraph from Sherlock Holmes). Do you understand what this means? Have you ever thought of the idea of beating a dead horse? I imagine a thousand My Little Ponies, each a different color, with fabulous mains and tails, hearts and stars, slowly dying and falling to the ground, and tiny little gnomes taking striped bats and hitting them, even after they are dead (reads the exact same paragraph as above that she read before, word for word, from Sherlock Holmes). That said, sometimes people do that. They happen to beat dead horses. Now that phrase is not to be taken literally, but figuratively. When people do that, they tend to over explain or repeat themselves over and over and over again. Did I mention that this happens more than once? It happens over and over. This is called. B.A.D.H. That stands for beating a dead horse (reads the exact same paragraph as above that she read before, word for word, from Sherlock Holmes). Now let's look at some studies where more people tell you how to beat a dead horse. Then I'll tell you again after the study how to beat a dead horse.

AAAARGH!

Yes, she actually makes an abbreviation for the words motivation to remember, referring to it as "M.T.R." Guffaw.

If there were even ONE new, original or helpful idea in that first hour, I would have been so grateful I would have clicked my heels in glee. But alas, they were all useless ridiculous time fillers like, "did you know that we often don't pay attention to things?…our minds are like an attic, it may look funny, it may have a little chimney, but it may not have a chimney…sometimes people remind us of other people…people who try harder on tests do better…sometimes we all have first impressions or prejudices…have you ever had the experience of forgetting something?...and on and on and on and on….with not one helpful hint in sight.

Also, she reads entire passages from Sherlock Holmes word for word not only twice, but sometimes THREE TIMES in a paragraph! She can't just say, "referring to the paragraph I just mentioned, x y and z", NO, she has to read the ENTIRE THING again and again! I have never seen an editor let an author get away with such ridiculousness, which is why I say she must have been paid by the word.

And could the narrator sound any more condescending? The only thing she should ever read is something that ends in "And thank you for flying the friendly skies"! It was like listening to a debutante talk down to her toy poodle. I almost expected her to chime in with, "And where does Mimi go poopoo? In the widdle doggie doo box, that's RIGHT my little Angelpie!"

At the end of my run, I clicked my iPod off, and when I turned if on again, the book went back to the beginning and HAS NO CHAPTER MARKERS! Which means I WOULD HAVE TO LISTEN TO THE BEGINNING OVER AGAIN to hear the entire thing!

I would rather die a slow death in a sand pit being bitten by snakes while tigers claw out my eyes and vultures pull out my tongue than listen to that again.

But if anyone has a version with chapter markers I'd love to give the rest of the book a chance to see if there are any actual instructions on how to think like Sherlock Holmes. Maybe my first impression of the book from the first chapter is incongruent with the rest of the book. I would be happy to find this to be the case.

P.S. I have listened to hundreds of audio books and in case people think I'm just a grump, this is the first scathing review I've ever given.

I had high hopes for this book. I had just finished some really cool books on Buddhism, and I thought this book would have been a really fun approach to "brain training." It is the only book that I did not finish in the first week of purchase, and I have already moved onto the next one.

narrator does an alright job, speaks clearly and easy to hear. but most of the book is just references of experiments or Sherlock Holmes quotes. not much on teaching us how to open our minds and be more perceptive, but does give us a realistic expectation on how IT IS possible to think like Sherlock in a way.

The narrator grips your imagination in a sentence, she finds good use of adjectives and causes you to tune in to her narration of the book. I like how she descirbes our brains as either system Watson or system Holmes, the characters unfold in your mind as it helped me discover clearer thinking.Big thanks for the book, "How to think like sherlock holmes."